Aftermath
by marysverse
Summary: He feels a flash of guilt, but then gets mad all over again. Why should he feel guilty for falling for her? Why should he have to swallow the bruises on her faces, the cuts marring her pearly skin?


**The Watchtower**

"I won't be responsible." She looks at him, her passion for the JLA outweighing him, surpassing him.

"He hurt you, how am I supposed to get passed that?"

"You know the deal Oliver, he wasn't himself."

A sad look settles on her face. She studies my clenched jaw, my eyes that burn with the need for revenge.

"This was supposed to be simple, we were never supposed to get to this point."

He feels a flash of guilt, but then gets mad all over again. Why should he feel guilty for falling for her? Why should he feel bad for wanting her to be safe and in his arms? Why should he have to swallow the bruises on her faces, the cuts marring her pearly skin?

Before he knew it, his fist was crashing through a nearby wall.

"You always defend him, no matter what you defend him. When is it going to be too much? How much are you going to give to him? Look at yourself Chloe! Take a good long look in the mirror and tell me its okay!"

Shaking her head, "You're misunderstanding me. My feelings have nothing to do with what I'm asking you to do. You know what's at stake, if you alienate him, we will forever be out of the loop. He's our inside man right now. For better or for worse, we'd be a lot blinder without him."

Carefully he looked at her, trying to discern the honesty in her words. But he really couldn't tell, she mixed him up and turned him about.

"So what are your feelings?" He looked away as he asked this, not wanting her to be able to read how much he had riding on her answer.

Tilting her head to one side, it looked like she was contemplating that for the first time.

"I'm not sure, I need time to process."

"And us?" Holding his breath he waited.

She looked down, biting her lip softly.

"I like us, I'm happy with us. As long as 'us' doesn't jeopardize the big things." She smiled at him, but the long jagged slash on her upper lip broke upon, and the reassuring effect it was supposed to have was ruined. Oliver narrowed his eyes at the fresh blood.

"If you can't handle this, than we have to get out. What we have only works if we are able to keep our eyes on the prize."

He laughed to himself, a soft chuckle that was completely mirthless. Wasn't he supposed to be the martyred hero, giving up on love for the rest of humanity, for the wellbeing of the human race?

But it was her this time. The one that saw everything could only focus on the future. Bits of her were disappearing, being sacrificed for 'a greater good;' she gave too easy.

"I can't lose you." He admitted this softly, barely audible over the hum of her supercomputers.

Her eyes snapped to his, her beautiful lips with the slash that was going to leave yet another scar twisting into a grimace.

"Of course you can, you have to. You know nothing else matters in the end. We know that he is on the fence; he doesn't know where to side. We have to keep him on ours." Big green eyes pierced his, knowing eyes that knew at his core, he agreed with her. He had a feeling those eyes would haunt him for however long he lived.

He went to reach for her, to try to connect with her, it was the only way she responded to him, it was the only time he was completely sure that she was his.

But she pulled away, telling him she was tired, asking him to go home.

He found himself stumbling out of the Watchtower before he even knew what had just happened, the locks clicking in place behind him.

Once again, she slipped through his grasp and left him without direction.

**Back Inside the Watchtower**

She allowed herself to sag against the pain; it had taken all of her willpower not to let him know how much pain she was in.

But now in the privacy of her own company she could bow to the sharp twisting stabs, and deep gut wrenching aches that wracked her body.

She slowly stripped off the softest button up top she had been able to find that morning when she had realized she couldn't move her arms above her head to pull a regular top on, and that her clothes would rub at her wounds in all the wrong ways.

This wasn't the worst she had ever been through, but it certainly hurt the worst.

She would have given anything to have Oliver helping her with this, taking care of her and holding her gently in comfort.

But he hadn't seen the extent of the damage and his reaction to her face meant he couldn't see her like this until some of the damage faded.

She walked painfully over to the long mirror; she hadn't really seen what she looked like yet.

Purple and blue bloomed all over her body, an angry red handprint on her chest from when he had sent her flying through the air.

Really he hadn't done all this damage. He had sent her crashing through the wall and ceiling, but it was the fall onto the glass table that had really beat her up. Turning around, she looked at her backside. There was literally no part of her that wasn't scraped, bruised or cut.

Glass was painful, it hurt going in and it hurt coming out. She had made Emil swear he would never tell anyone how bad off she was before she allowed him to fix her up.

He pulled out tiny slivers and large chunks and wicked looking spikes, but they all hurt the same. Some he had to stitch up, some he just bandaged, and he did it quietly and efficiently.

She never noticed the redness of his eyes as he fought to hold back tears as he worked on her. She didn't realize how close he had come to quitting after he had to wrench her shoulder back into place upon finding the dislocation.

How could he have done this to her? Isn't this the guy that was supposed to save them all?

She didn't understand why she was so fascinated by the damage. But she stood, transfixed in front of her mirror staring at her half-naked form. Silently thanking Emil's expertise in her head. Tiny stitches made for tiny scars, that was the general rule. But even the big gashes that wouldn't hold with a small stitch were welded shut so they wouldn't pucker and heal funny.

A sharp intake of breath let her know he was there. She had thought he would come, but had anticipated being dressed at the time, knowing he took awhile to castrate himself for everything he'd done before hunting forgiveness.

Part of her thought to cover herself up, to shield him from the truth of his actions. But she was too tired and it hurt too much to move and make a fuss. She wanted nothing more than to lay done, but the prospect of having pressure on any part of her body made tears want to spring into her eyes.

Turning around she faced him, his breath hissed out of his teeth as he saw her front half.

What could he say to her?

The silence stretched between them; his self-hatred growing exponentially as he inventoried her injuries.

"Listen Clark," she began suddenly, startling him, "I don't want an apology or an explanation or…anything. I don't want anything. You've seen what you wanted to see, so just go home and leave me be."

He took a step forward and she took one back.

"I was infected with Red K, I would never do something like this to you."

"You did do this to me Clark. I know that you turn into your alter-ego, but he's still you and he wouldn't have done it if it wasn't something you really wanted to do."

A horrified look washed over his face.

"You think I wanted this?"

Sighing she turned away to look in the mirror again.

"You wanted to punish me, you've been punishing me. I don't really know what for, and now I don't really care to know. You don't trust me and a part of you hates me. I know you don't see it, but I do."

"I don't hate you!"

Shaking her head at him she briefly meets his gaze in the reflection before dropping her eyes down.

"Your mom once told me that your Red K was like a truth serum, it may be uglier and rougher than you ever wanted, but she always knew what was in your heart when you were influenced."

Shock flashed across his face, he couldn't believe she actually thought he wanted to hurt her. But then he swallowed his rage and indignation, after all, he had hurt her, she looked like she had barely survived it, and he tried to think.

But as horrible as it sounds, even with the bruising and the cuts, she was beautiful and her standing in the dark, naked and vulnerable was proving to be extremely distracting. Maybe she was right, maybe he was just a bad, bad man.

Dragging his eyes away he tried to clear his head.

"A part of me is mad at you and yeah, I guess I have been punishing you by shutting you out of my life. But this Chloe, this is something incomprehensible to me. Sure, I'm mean when I'm on Red K, you know that better then anyone and yeah the part of me that wants to hurt you comes out but to _physically_ hurt you? No way, there is nothing in me that wants any part of that."

"I've decided I don't care." Gingerly she perched on a chair, gritting her teeth as her skin and muscles screamed silently in protest.

"What do you mean?" He asked while his heart started sinking slowly to his stomach.

"I don't care the whys or what fors. You and I have come to the end. We still work together but these sad attempts to get our friendship back on track are done, we are platonic and we are professional."

"Just let me explain!"

"No. How many times do you need to hurt me for you to do the right thing and let go?"

He had no answer for that. He didn't even know how to tackle that sort of question. He wanted to tell her he was angry at her for moving along without him. For adjusting and adapting with a spring in her step the whole time. But that was before, before he had realized he was the one that had abandoned her.

So now he really wasn't sure why he would still be angry at her. A tiny voice in him had told him to punch Oliver in the face the other day when he had witnessed their reunion. And he had wanted to pry them as far apart as he could when they had started talking to each other with their eyes.

She used to be able to do that with him. One look and he knew exactly what was on hers and she on his.

But that doesn't explain why he's mad at her. Cause he's not mad at her. There is nothing to me mad at. She's happy with Oliver and he's happy with Lois.

And she's standing there all cold and distant, but more naked and vulnerable than he had ever seen her and god help him, he wanted her, in every way, in any way. Didn't she know that he was barely hanging on, had barely been hanging on.

Collapsing in front of her, he let his strong façade go. The air of invulnerability and self-assuredness dissipated and he slumped in front of her. What could he do, what could he say?

She wanted no apologies, he couldn't ask her to forgive him, it was too much to forgive. The worst thing was he couldn't even remember what made him so crazed.

He didn't remember throwing her with all his strength sending her high up and through the farthest corner of the wall. Why would he do that?

She was…undefineable. He didn't know the words to describe what she was to him. And he'd felt it, he had been losing her for awhile.

But maybe the tenuous grasp he had thought he had on her wasn't real. Maybe he'd been holding on to a ghost of what they had. Maybe he had lost her a long time ago.

Stalemate.


End file.
